Can feminism be right wing?

[DisgustedofManchester]

This popped up on twitter today ( its an image I cannot share that basically says that 90% of the news that fairplayforwomen interacts with leans right ) and its an interesting question especially with regard to gender critical feminism because the ideology with regards to trans rights and trans people does match the views of traditionally conservative groups like men's rights activists, the christian right, conservative politics and the generally socially conservative.

The conundrum is that I see many GC accounts also being for example anti-brexit which is not a right wing position or is it a case of my enemy's enemy is my friend? Even if they are anti-feminists as well. Or is right wing feminism where women now feel more represented?

Feminism is about, and for, females.

This crosses all borders.

Religious

Local - Elections in Scotland and in London (Mayoral elections)

Business (Hello Asda)

Political - Northern Ireland MNetters (Keep raising the issues about your health/travel issues)

Scottish MNetters (We are here supporting you)

Welsh MNetters (enjoy your holidays ladies )

Irish MNetters - Keep posting. We'll support you however we can!

@LisaStansfield

And everyone who supports trans people’s rights to have access to appropriate healthcare, and to participate fully in public life without discrimination gets told they are eRaSiNg wOmEn, are pro putting rapists in female prisons, pro paedo grooming gangs, and pro drugging confused pre pubescent gay children. It’s a crazy world and we need more peace love and understanding all round hey

I support appropriate healthcare. Children shouldn't be given dangerous and untested medication, as confirmed recently in court.

Of course transwomen should be free to participate in every aspect of public life.

Public life does not include single sex spaces reserved for the privacy, dignity and comfort of women, or spaces/roles/programmes that were created to try and counter the effect of the biological features of female-hood that tend to disadvantage women.

Male bodied people usually understand that by entering a space created by and for women to discuss private and personal experiences around things that will only ever affect women - such as, say, miscarriage - they will cause offence, upset and distress.

What kind of a person would transgress those boundaries, knowing that they are going to cause distress?

Arabella Aristocrat

(I've provided lazy, simplified signifiers for the sake of this thread)

Male bodied people usually understand that by entering a space created by and for women to discuss private and personal experiences around things that will only ever affect women - such as, say, miscarriage - they will cause offence, upset and distress

What kind of a person would transgress those boundaries, knowing that they are going to cause distress?

Transwomen who also state that they are transsexual males and understand that they must also stay in their sex-based lane understand this.

They not only understand this: they publically state this.

For the Census.
On all government documentation.
In private.
Publically in society.

They do this so that they can present themselves with a high degree of femininity, without being attacked by other males. And without taking away places/spaces/opportunities from females (women and girls)

Arabella, what trans women are trying to join miscarriage groups? what trans women are 'demanding to share bedrooms' with women fleeing domestic violence? I agree about sports, and that needs to be a conversation. and everyone fleeing violence should have their boundaries respected. but this focusing on the most extreme examples and exaggerating them (like the continual conflation of puberty blockers with cross sex hormones and the misrepresentation that doctors are flinging them out like sweeties to anyone with eyeliner, black nail polish and a razor blade necklace - oh, and all parents of trans children are homophobes) is not conducive to respectful dialogue.

where is your understanding for the trans women who were using an app which explicitly welcomed them, who had their profiles lifted off that and openly mocked by a straight cis man? how do you square the circle of avoiding a lifetime of medical intervention for trans people, trans people feeling at war with their bodies etc, when trans or gender fluid people who reject hormones and surgery are then held up to ridicule for not passing, or for 'identifying as attack helicopters' or whatever? And however much "gender critical" people like to couch their rhetoric in "concern for the women and children", you know as well as I do that there is a big element of 'eww those freaks' and mocking people's appearance and presentation in the mix. I will hold my hands up and say I report loads of threads in FWR that are nothing to do with safe guarding or single sex spaces, that are just about slagging off specific trans individuals, calling them narcissists, attention seekers, perverts etc. I never see any "gender critical' posters call this out, ever.

you have no idea at all that my peace love and understanding goes only in one direction, that's completely you projecting on to me because I'm not being sufficiently "gender critical" for this board's groupthink. I have the wrong opinion, so I'm an awful person who laughs in abused women's faces and amputates gay children's breasts on the school run for shits and giggles. there is some awful behaviour on both sides of this debate.

In short: No.

Slightly longer: Feminism has always been a progressive position that requires moving away from traditionally held patriarchal positions.

The side generally wanting to "maintain the family unit," or pushing for nationalistic policies that move back towards a pre-60s household are very much the right. The side pushing fundamentalist religious views (such as opposition of abortion in America, or more recently, N. Ireland) are always right-wing.
Women's liberation has always been a negative to conservatives, they opposed women having the vote because they couldn't see why women would ever vote for them.

Essentially: When the left doesn't support women (yes TW too before someone brings their obsession out), they're failing at what should be one of the core principles of a kinder and more progressive society. When the right doesn't support women, they're sticking to their core principles.

Obviously, this varies from country to country but England's taken a hard step to the right since Brexit and I don't trust them to not betray women and LGBT people the moment it's convenient.

I support appropriate healthcare. Children shouldn't be given dangerous and untested medication, as confirmed recently in court.

Just gonna roll my eyes and chuckle that the courts shat all over the Bell ruling today.

The side pushing fundamentalist religious views (such as opposition of abortion in America, or more recently, N. Ireland) are always right-wing.

one of the things I found so fascinating about Mrs America was realising that, actually, opposition to abortion and contraception was not necessarily a right wing view before the republicans started courting religious fundamentalists. it actually makes sense that if you love capitalism and money, you would support women having control over their fertility, because it makes them more productive in the workplace. also, the state taking a hands off approach to whatever people want to do in their private lives is a right wing position. it was interesting to me to see how religious fundamentalism changed the face of politics, and how this disproportionately affected women, especially with a similar thing happening at roughly the same time in Iran and Afghanistan.

what trans women are 'demanding to share bedrooms' with women fleeing domestic violence?

Here is two articles that I have found with a quick search. Albeit one is in Canada.

www.womenarehuman.com/womens-refuge-allows-male-transgender-who-threatened-to-kill-his-female-partner/

nationalpost.com/news/canada/kristi-hanna-human-rights-complaint-transgender-woman-toronto-shelter

There has also been a report recently of a transwoman who was watching porn and masturbating in a women’s refuge late last year in a shared dorm.

The point is, women’s refuges are being forced via funding demands, to accept trans women into women’s refuges. This is a safeguarding issue yet, women are also told that they are transphobic if they complain. I feel It is exactly along the same lines as coercing women, all women but particularly rape victims, to accept transwomen hcp to do intimate procedures through stating it is transphobic to do so.

that first trans woman sounds awful but it doesn't say she was sharing a bedroom? and in the second example, again, not acceptable, but it sounds like the trans woman didn't actually do anything to her room mate beyond wear big boots. again, not acceptable - but anyone who thinks all cis women in refuges are nice and quiet and supportive of one another and all get along great all the time is being naive. this case is very tragic - but it shows that being a cis woman in a refuge with other cis women is not magic protection against a violent man turning up. refuges in general are underfunded and struggling to help women and more needs to be done, I happen to think demonising trans women does little to help in this.

It's not about numbers. It's the concept of sex segregation.

Are women entitled to it or not?

@LisaStansfield

that first trans woman sounds awful but it doesn't say she was sharing a bedroom? and in the second example, again, not acceptable, but it sounds like the trans woman didn't actually do anything to her room mate beyond wear big boots. again, not acceptable - but anyone who thinks all cis women in refuges are nice and quiet and supportive of one another and all get along great all the time is being naive. this case is very tragic - but it shows that being a cis woman in a refuge with other cis women is not magic protection against a violent man turning up. refuges in general are underfunded and struggling to help women and more needs to be done, I happen to think demonising trans women does little to help in this.

The point is, are women who are recovering from male violence entitled to have space and privacy to recover without the presence of males (whatever their gender).

If you believe that traumatized women should have to accept a male in their safe space, why? Have you listened to traumatized women when they have spoke about this? If you don’t believe them when they state sharing space with males (not just those presenting as men) but all males retraumatise them, that is your perogative I guess.

But women attempting to speak out are being silenced. Why are their needs less important than a transwoman? And why are trans people not lobbying for their own spaces to get them up and running?

That is the point we are trying to make. Because there are quite a few other articles out there just like those, but that isn’t the point.

The point is males being placed with females when females have been subject to male violence already. Should they or shouldn’t they have space away from all males over a certain age?

@Hibari

I support appropriate healthcare. Children shouldn't be given dangerous and untested medication, as confirmed recently in court.

Just gonna roll my eyes and chuckle that the courts shat all over the Bell ruling today.

Munchausen's by proxy sufferers can now maunch to their hearts content and homophobic parents can trans away the gay more easily today yes, but parents can still protect their kids from social pressure and the delusion they can literally change sex until they come of age.

@Hibari

I support appropriate healthcare. Children shouldn't be given dangerous and untested medication, as confirmed recently in court.

Just gonna roll my eyes and chuckle that the courts shat all over the Bell ruling today.

So you have no problem with children being given dangerous and untested medication? Good to know.

but it shows that being a cis woman in a refuge with other cis women is not magic protection against a violent man turning up

This isn't the point: the point is vulnerable and traumatised women having to share spaces with male bodies people when they've been traumatised by male bodied people. Many women are much smaller than people who've been through male puberty. Many women in that situation have been raped by people with penises.

Why is it that women can't have safe spaces from the sex that is responsible for their trauma, but other vulnerable groups need protection even from words.

But women attempting to speak out are being silenced

are they though? where? on the five million 'trans people are awful aren't they?' threads on here? on twitter where you can't chuck a brick without hitting someone with "I heart jk Rowling" or a "super straight" emoji in their handle (waits for cries of "omg TRAs want to CHUCK BRICKS at women")? in parliamentary select committees, where definite poster boy for the cover of Sanity Fair glinner moaned about being banned from twitter for an hour, till he had to be reminded he wasn't at speaker's corner? disagreement isn't silencing. online abuse is unnecessary and unpleasant, but it isn't silencing (and is also not one way traffic).

MN is the only mainstream social media platform where you can talk about this issue without getting threats of violence, being doxxed or just completely banned. MN have come under huge and repeated pressure to shut this board down with targeted campaigns against companies who advertise here

but you already know this

Found someone acting out a stillbirth in a breastfeeding support group, to the distress of women who had had miscarriages. That count?

Trigger Warning: nauseating content

grahamlinehan.substack.com/p/princess-mom

@Kit19

MN is the only mainstream social media platform where you can talk about this issue without getting threats of violence, being doxxed or just completely banned. MN have come under huge and repeated pressure to shut this board down with targeted campaigns against companies who advertise here

but you already know this

people get kicked off twitter for doxxing and threats all the time, on both sides. people have the right to campaign against transphobia on here (and there is transphobia on here, people get deleted for it all the time) and discuss what is/is not transphobic, and guess what! they will disagree with one another. no one's being silenced. people are exercising their free speech, which does not mean 'without consequence' speech, or 'against the terms of use you agreed to' speech. on both sides.

@Hibari

I support appropriate healthcare. Children shouldn't be given dangerous and untested medication, as confirmed recently in court.

Just gonna roll my eyes and chuckle that the courts shat all over the Bell ruling today.

The subject is children's longterm health and happiness, and you're rolling your eyes and chuckling? I find your comment in really poor taste.

Arabella, what trans women are trying to join miscarriage groups?

This is from my own personal experience. Obviously, it would be very outing to share details, so it's an anecdote, I'm afraid.

I think there can be issues that are feminist issues where there is common ground with people, female and male, who are right wing. The campaign to end page 3 was an example.

@CousinKrispy

What's there in Manchester to be disgusted with?

Well there's a Soviet statue of Engels which is incredibly offensive to Ukrainians (of which there are quite a few living there: www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jul/19/manchester-soviet-statue-engels-ukrainians

@FFSFFSFFS

I don't think that's really even a relevant question re "gender critical". Its a basic question of material reality - hence why people from vastly different political perspectives agree.

I am always so perplexed when the term TERF is used - as if its only some small group of feminists who know that women don't have dicks....99.9999% of the world know that there are two sexes (and yes some intersex). It's not a political belief. It's reality.

This^^